


The Locked Room

by boblemon



Category: Arashi (Band)
Genre: AU, Crossover, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-03-02
Updated: 2014-03-02
Packaged: 2018-01-14 07:34:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1258183
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/boblemon/pseuds/boblemon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Sho has come to rely on Nino for help in solving a series of difficult cases involving locked rooms, but this time everything is becoming too personal to be comfortable.</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Locked Room

**Author's Note:**

> Thanks to r_tenou for putting me back on track on this.Think of this as the final episode to “Kagi no Kakatta Heya: Season 2.” (A/N: This was written before the special aired.) Names from the original drama have remained the same for authenticity, so forgive my inconsistency. *Spoilers for the end of Kagi no Kakatta Heya, and some implications for things that followed.* 
> 
> Written for the shoneen contest on livejournal and slightly edited for grammatical purposes. The original post can be found at my livejournal community [here](http://saigo-no-lady.livejournal.com/37343.html).

It was not part of his job description, but Sakurai Sho found himself playing detective more than a lawyer should.  
  
Not to say that lawyers didn’t need skills of deduction and reasoning, because they did. It just seemed to be that the cases Sho got caught up in were out of his jurisdiction, involving murder more often than not, and all over they should have been left to the police instead.  
  
But whenever the client came up and told their story, Sho could just never quite say no.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
“But the doors were all locked! All of the windows and air vents too, not to mention there was a brand new security device installed last week!”  
  
“I didn’t necessarily say the culprit had to be _in_ here to kill her,” Nino replied smoothly with that signature smirk of his that told Sho he had solved the case down to the last hair out of place. “Your grandmother came into her room last night, ready to go to bed, and locked everything as per her daily habit. Without thinking anything was out of place, she laid down here.” He illustrated his words by waving his hand towards the bed.  
  
The occupants of the room, Sho and his partner Aiba, along with his boss Serizawa and three of the suspects of the case, turned to watch Nino as he took a step closer to the bed and pulled back the covers carefully.  
  
“She laid her head on the pillow, as usual.” Nino patted the pillow, looking at one of the suspects in particular, the woman’s grandson. “And the trap was triggered.”  
  
True to Nino’s words, in a few seconds a thin line appeared against his palm, becoming more distinct as time ticked away. To prove his point, Nino reached into the air with his other hand, revealing a thin plastic fishing line coming from the ceiling that was otherwise invisible to the rest of the room.  
  
“Taking into account the sleeping powder that was slipped into your grandmother’s dinner, it was no surprise she didn’t feel something that subtle until it was too late. Given her health, something this simple would have been enough to kill her and put the forged will into action.”  
  
That’s right, the only reason this case had even landed on Sho’s desk to begin with was because of that will. Just like the slew of previous mysteries he’d solved—with Nino’s help—there was no piecing the clues together enough to make a case out of it for the police, who had deemed it a natural death. The prime suspect, the woman’s middle aged daughter, had begged their law office to re-check the case. Serizawa had a reputation for solving these kinds of problems after all, a job that somehow got dropped onto Sho’s shoulders once Aoto was transferred.  
  
“Why was there nothing found at the crime scene, then?” Aiba asked curiously, and Nino glared at him coolly for the interruption.  
  
“That’s simple. See this air vent located under the bed,” Nino said, leaning down and pointing to indicate the one he meant. “There are miniscule abrasions on the filters.”  
  
Sho almost gasped when he realized the reason Nino had been so curious about that area when they had come to examine the crime scene together two days earlier. Nino really was a genius, and worth putting up with his quirks and anti-social behavior for the help he provided in return.  
  
Since Aiba (and several other people, including his boss, Serizawa) still looked confused, Nino continued smugly, “This line is thin enough to fit through the filter. So the culprit simply pulled it all out of the room when she was dead.” Nino tapped on the wall and someone in the other room began to retract the line, Nino holding it to illustrate how it was disappearing. “Pull it tight to make sure it does its job, and it’ll snap when enough pressure is put on it. It explains the thin bruise on her neck that the police dismissed as a sign of ageing.”  
  
“Amazing…” Serizawa mumbled under his breath in wonder. “I knew it all along,” he added after a pause, giving an arrogant smile to Sho which Sho immediately ignored. His attention was taken up by the concluded perpetrator, who was shifting around, slipping his hand into his pocket as subtly as he could under the circumstances.  
  
“And who was the only one with access to the next room…?” Nino asked slowly with a vicious smirk on his face, turning to the family huddled together against the other wall.  
  
“No…” the original suspected whimpered, turning to her son just as he threw himself at Nino, an expression of rage on his face.  
  
But Sho made it in time, planting himself in front of Nino, who stumbled back in surprise, his legs hitting the side of the bed with a thud. Sho grabbed the son’s wrists (thankful the thing in his hand was a small knife and not a gun) and fought to hold him back. Who the winner would be was obvious—Sho attended the gym twice a week in his free time, and this boy was barely twenty years old and unseasoned in fighting.  
  
Within a few seconds, Sho tackled him to the floor and accepted the pair of handcuffs Aiba rushed over to give him. They’d started carrying a pair around, since it seemed like this happened whenever Nino revealed the locked room trick—unlike Enomoto had been, Nino was ruthless in delivering the truth, and reveled in that moment when he knew without a doubt he was right. Because of that, Sho had been faced with violence more often than emotional breakdowns, although he couldn’t deny the fact that Nino hadn’t been wrong yet.  
  
“The police should already be on their way,” Aiba told him quietly, then went straight over to comfort the mother, who had begun crying when she realized the truth.  
  
“That was brilliant, Nino! Just like Enomoto!” Serizawa complimented him, striding over to give Nino a pat on the back.  
  
Immediately Nino pulled away with an irritated look. “I told you not to touch me,” he said sharply, averting his eyes. He glanced over at Sho quickly, but when Nino realized Sho was looking back, he turned away from him too, probably embarrassed at the fact that he couldn’t defend himself, even though this had happened at least three times during the cases they’d solved together.  
  
“Sorry, sorry,” Serizawa replied quickly, although he didn’t sound like he meant it at all. “How about going for drinks tonight to celebrate? On me,” he offered with a grin.  
  
“Not interested in going out with anyone,” responded Nino in the same neutral tone. “Except Sho,” he added under his breath shyly and shot Sho another look that held a bit more meaning this time.  
  
Sho looked away quickly.  
  
The first time he’d met Nino was months ago, when he’d gone to Tokyo Sougo Security to ask several employees about Enomoto and his disappearance.  
  
Enomoto had left next to nothing behind once he’d gone, other than two clues that were not nearly enough to piece together a case against him and the diamonds he’d stolen. A few conversations led Sho into the basement, where Enomoto’s office had once been. Now it housed another employee, the only one with lock skills comparable to Enomoto.  
  
Nino.  
  
If it wasn’t taboo enough for him to be using a potential criminal’s old office, everyone else in the company avoided Nino due to his sharp attitude. Because of that, the first time Sho came, he swallowed his anxiety and met him alone. That meeting was still a blur, but, although Nino didn’t have any insight on Enomoto, he helped Sho with another case that had been plaguing him, and that had led Sho to come back time and time again.  
  
It didn’t help that Nino seemed unwilling to aid anyone else but Sho.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
“Maybe it’s better if you wait up here,” Sho told him hesitantly, when they arrived in the lobby of Tokyo Sougo Security.  
  
“No! Sho, you _promised_ —“ Aiba whined, with a pout sent straight to the heart. “I want to see Nino’s office!”  
  
Sho couldn’t say no to most people, and he was particularly weak to Aiba.  
  
“I tried,” he sighed, and strode off past the reception desk, where the woman greeted him, but didn’t stop him from entering. He’d only been here a few days ago, on the day Nino had revealed the wire trick. It took less than twenty four hours for the police to get a confession out of the grandson, who had tried to frame his own mother using the forged will.  
  
“Ah, Sho-san!”  
  
Sho looked over at the man coming towards him from the large room filled with people on their computers, and bowed in a formal greeting.  
  
“Matsumoto-san.”  
  
“And Aiba’s here too!” Matsumoto grinned, and patted Aiba on the shoulder in a friendly fashion. “You guys are here to see Nino again?”  
  
“Yes,” Sho replied, and Aiba added, “We brought cake!” happily.  
  
“Well, he’s in his office as usual. He’s in a particularly bad mood today.” Jun was just about the only person in the office that dealt with Nino, and by his expression, he was glad Sho and Aiba were there to take some of the heat away from him.  
  
“Cake will cheer him up!” Aiba said with a grin, but Sho and Jun just sighed.  
  
“Bring him some coffee too, would you?” Jun asked, indicating the break-room.  
  
“Aiba,” Sho directed, motioning for him to do it, and Aiba nodded without hesitation. Sho was the senior, if only by a year or so. “I’ll go down first.”  
  
“Okay, see you in a minute!”  
  
Sho was glad about the distraction for Aiba, and hurried towards the stairs in the corner. He headed down the flight as fast as he could, and past boxes that indicated a storage area, before he reached Nino’s office. It still looked like it had when Enomoto had been there, full of the things he had left behind, but the company had taken over some of the extra room, and of course Nino’s things were there too, making a bit cluttered.  
  
“Nino,” he called out, not waiting for a reply before he walked past a platform on his right and into the wider area of the room, where the other man would no doubt be playing video games. It was a wonder they hadn’t fired him for that, but then again, losing a man like Enomoto must have been a huge blow to a company like this.  
  
“Sho!”  
  
As expected, he’d been sitting in a rolling chair in front of the oversized TV—a new addition to the room along with all the consoles and the wide game collection surrounding it—but stood as soon as Sho entered the area.  
  
“Sorry to bother you,” Sho said politely with a quick bow.  
  
It was awkward, because Nino’s face looked so open and cute right now, completely different from times he was around other people. Sho remembered the first time Nino gave him that look—in their first case together, after Sho had saved him from a firm beating from their targeted suspect. The man had been a mansion’s bodyguard and Sho had walked away with bruises and a fractured forearm, but he didn’t want to think of the damage that could have been done to Nino in his stead.  
  
“I’m never bothered when you come to spend time with me,” Nino replied shyly, his full attention still on Sho. “What’d you come for today? Did that kid confess to everything?”  
  
“Well, yes,” Sho replied unsurely. Although part of his reason to come today had been to thank Nino for his help—again—there was also a much more serious topic he wanted to discuss, and hopefully before Aiba came back—  
  
“Sho-kun! Nino!”  
  
Too late.  
  
The door banged open, and Aiba came crashing in, as if he’d run all the way there.  
  
“What’s _he_ doing here?” Nino asked with irritation, the expression on his face changing instantly as he glanced towards the back of the room with narrow eyes.  
  
“Nino! I came to see your office! Wow, isn’t this neat?” Aiba babbled as he came towards them, the box of cake and a cup of coffee in hand. Jun came behind him with another two cups, looking vaguely annoyed. He placed them on the table and promptly left.  
  
“Who said you could come in here?” Nino demanded in a low voice. He was acting like a cat trying to protect his territory from an oversized dog. “I hate when people come into my office!”  
  
“Look at this glass case! Are the things in there expensive?” Aiba asked, ignoring Nino’s comments, since that was the easiest way to deal with him. In fact, Nino basically treated everyone like this—except Sho, by some miracle. Of course the first time they’d met he had—it’d taken Sho a lot of convincing to get Nino to help him—but after the first case something shifted and Nino suddenly became willing. Sho had learned to appreciate the affection over the course of the rough cases they’d gone through.  
  
“Oh, what’s this? A lamp?” Aiba asked next, without even bothering to wait for the answer, moving around the room in a circle and examining everything. “And videogames?!”  
  
Sho watched with exasperation as Aiba started reaching for game cases on the shelf, and Nino as he furiously tried to stop him.  
  
“Don’t touch them! _No one_ touches my games. Not even Sho-san!” Nino sounded genuinely angry this time, tearing the case out of Aiba’s grip and immediately buffing the plastic on his shirt to rid it of finger prints. “Everything in here is first edition! These are my babies! You can’t even _buy_ this anymore!” he ranted with a red face, and Aiba finally gave in and turned to the table standing in the middle of the room, leaving him alone.  
  
Aiba loved to tease Nino, or at least did it unconsciously, and that’s why Sho hadn’t wanted him to come in the first place.  
  
“So, yes, the case from last week has been concluded,” Sho told Nino firmly, trying to get the situation back on track. “Thank you for your cooperation.”  
  
“It was nothing,” Nino pouted in return, still upset but making an effort to be polite to Sho. He continued to check the game case with scrutiny under the lights hanging overhead.  
  
“Thank you, Nino!” Aiba said peppily, and sat his coffee down next to the other two cups in order to undo the box the cake was inside. “I brought your favorite!”  
  
“It’s not like I asked you to,” Nino insisted, finally putting the case back on the shelf where it had been a few moments ago, his actions careful and controlled.  
  
“Don’t be that way,” Aiba replied, pulling out one of the stools stored under the table and sitting down to organize things more easily.  
  
“Nino, there’s something else we need to talk about,” Sho said seriously, taking a step closer. “Enomoto was sighted last night.”  
  
That got Nino’s attention, his eyes wide as he looked at Sho for confirmation. “What?!”  
  
“A train station employee submitted a report to the police office this morning, and they contacted me about it, since it’s my case.”  
  
“That’s…” Nino composed himself and forced an awkward smile. “Impossible. You know as well as I do that Enomoto isn’t that careless.”  
  
“He was caught on the surveillance camera. I have a copy,” Sho explained, placed his briefcase on another one of the stools so he could open it and pull out the folder he’d put together for Nino just before they’d come over.  
  
Nino immediately started looking the information over, sitting on his rolling chair and joining them so they were all crowded around the table.  
  
“It looks like him… But this could have been faked,” Nino declared.  
  
“I know.”  
  
“And the picture’s not that crisp anyway!”  
  
“I know,” Sho said patiently.  
  
“So what are you saying, then?”  
  
“Nothing. I just needed to know that you weren’t hiding something.”  
  
Nino’s mouth dropped at the accusation and he shot Sho an offended look. “I can’t believe you! I promised I’d tell you, didn’t I? If he contacted me?”  
  
“I just needed to confirm it myself,” Sho said dryly, and took the file off the table to return it to his briefcase. “I trust you, you know that, right?”  
  
“Sho…”  
  
“I trust you Nino, so if you hear _anything_ you’ll contact me right away, won’t you?” he asked, piercing Nino with his best sincere look. With the way Nino had been treating him up until now, Sho didn’t think he had any reason to worry, but it was scary to consider that Nino was deceiving him. Out of everyone that had come up in the Enomoto case, Nino was in the position closest to the culprit, based on the testimonies of his co-workers. Aoto had attested to the same thing.  
  
Nino hesitated, but eventually replied, “Yes, I promise.”  
  
“Thank you,” Sho sighed in relief, and grasped Nino’s hand for a second to show his good intentions. He just wanted things set right, and would do what he needed to in order to capture Enomoto and make him face the crimes he’d committed.  
  
At the touch Nino’s tension melted away, and he slumped a little in his chair. He grasped Sho’s hand so hard in return that Sho couldn’t pull it away without using enough effort to make him embarrassed, so he left it there, trying to add to the equity he had with Nino.  
  
“Well, I’m glad everything worked out,” Aiba commented with a grin, digging into the piece of cake that belonged to him—he’d picked it out himself at the cake shop, along with one for Nino and Sho. Nino followed suit and docilely nibbled at his desert while Sho decided to go for his coffee instead.  
  
There was still a long road to catching Enomoto Kei, but Sho could feel something shifting. The conclusion was coming, faster than he had expected it to.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
The afternoon sun was streaming through the cracks in the closed blinds, giving Sho even more of a headache than he already had. He rubbed his temples with both hands, slumping against his desk in exasperation.  
  
He’d gotten a phone call twenty minutes ago, and it’d ruined his day. It wasn’t like he hadn’t seen this coming, but the blow hurt more than Sho had thought it would.  
  
The report for a piece of evidence against Enomoto had come back from the lab, and he’d sent Aiba over to pick it up. As soon as his partner got back to the office Sho would look over it in detail, but from what Aiba had told him on the phone…  
  
He took a sip of lukewarm coffee from his mug and sighed angrily.  
  
“Sho-chan! Here I am—“ Aiba burst through the office door, and Sho stood up immediately to meet him, his tranquil mood shattering. “I came as fast as I could.” He must have been telling the truth, because he was panting for breath and sweat was dripping off of him.  
  
“Thank you, Aiba,” Sho replied formally, and didn’t wait to reach for the envelope when Aiba offered it to him.  
  
He tore it open and began glancing over the results on the page.  
  
 _Inaccurate match. Forged document._  
  
Those were the words that stood out against everything else, and Sho cringed, feeling like he was about to have a mental breakdown.  
  
Sho fell into his chair, throwing the papers onto the table and closing his eyes as he leaned back. One of their two scarce pieces of evidence was gone.  
  
“Maybe it’s a mistake…” Aiba asked tentatively. “We can take it to another office…”  
  
“No,” Sho rejected the idea immediately. The one he’d sent it to he’d trusted entirely, otherwise he wouldn’t have used them in the first place. “It’s probably accurate.”  
  
“I mean, how can it be fake?” Aiba whined, sitting down in the chair in front of Sho’s desk that was meant for client use. “The police found it!”  
  
Poor, naïve Aiba. He was still too green, and it was Sho’s job to fix that.  
  
“The police were probably the ones to forge it. If not for the purpose of creating evidence, at least using it to get a search warrant.”  
  
Aiba looked appalled at the idea, but Sho was convinced that was the case. He’d seen it happen more than once in his line of work.  
  
With this blow, their case wasn’t going to be able to hold up to anything. From the start it had been flimsy at best, but Sho had been hoping that he could piece something together, or that something else would show up.  
  
Without warning, his office door opened again, this time it was Serizawa coming in, looking disgruntled.  
  
“You are dropping that case, do you hear me?” he demanded. “It’s a waste of time, I’ve told you from the start!”  
  
Sho clenched his jaw, in the most terrible mood possible for dealing with his boss. “How can you just let him get away? He shamed your name with his crime, not to mention the police have already given up on bringing him to justice!”  
  
“Exactly! The police have given up. They’re not cooperating with you, and now you don’t even have any evidence!” he replied. “I got the report, they called me not five minutes after your partner here picked them up the results! You’ve been left high and dry!”  
  
“It doesn’t matter! We still have the second piece of evidence, the carpet with his prints on it!” Sho shot back. The prints hadn’t been clear—they weren’t even from his fingers, but his feet where he had been walking in socks—but it was enough to prove that he had been in the house. They just needed a more detailed report, one that they couldn’t get within Japan. They were on a waiting list for a university in Sweden, and Sho didn’t care if he had to pay for the report out of his own pocket anymore.  
  
“Give it up,” Serizawa demanded with an irritated look. “As your boss, I’m telling you to give it up. Stop wasting your time.”  
  
“Boss, could it be that…” Aiba broke in with wide eyes, “That you actually don’t want Enomoto to get caught?”  
  
Serizawa scrunched up his face and shook his head in disgust before shrugging his shoulders. Sho already knew of his boss’s affection for Enomoto—he’d never admit it for fear of public backlash, but the trail of cases they had solved together with Aoto had left Serizawa with a soft spot for the other man. It wasn’t something that Serizawa would admit out loud, especially not to Aiba, whom he considered too low on the company hierarchy for a serious conversation.  
  
“What I’m saying is that Sakurai could be actually _working_ for me with that time,” he said sharply with a pointed glare at Sho. Aiba glanced at him too, looking offended at the insult and ready to defend his partner, but Sho motioned for Aiba not to push the topic anymore.  
  
“My productivity is as high as ever,” Sho assured him in a stern voice, and began putting the report spread on his desk away to show that he was willing to leave the argument there for today.  
  
“Listen to my advice, Sakurai. Drop the case,” said Serizawa as a final warning before turning on his heel and heading back out the door.  
  
Once they were alone again, Aiba watched him and Sho gave him a determined look in return.  
  
“Check out that waiting list would you? See if there’s anything we can do to speed it up.”  
  
  
  
  
  
  
“Now this is the proper way to thank me!” Nino sighed happily, taking a gulp of his beer as he stared at Sho dreamily across the table. The air of the Japanese bar they’d met at was heavy with smoke and condensation, but that simply made the atmosphere more perfect.  
  
Sho had been in the mood to drink, and figured he might as well treat Nino as thanks for his help over the last few months. As expected, Aiba had wanted to come too, but Sho had managed to find a plausible excuse to leave him out. Dealing with Nino was a lot more trouble when Aiba was with him.  
  
“It’s nothing,” Sho assured him with a tense smile. He’d already explained everything about he forged evidence to Nino earlier over the phone. Nino hadn’t been surprised either, but had sympathized with him about the loss.  
  
“It’s really too bad about your case, though,” Nino replied with a consoling expression. “And then they moved the last piece of evidence out of the police headquarters and to that storage room…”  
  
“It’s cruel isn’t it?” Sho sighed. Everything had gone to hell that afternoon, so it was no wonder he wanted to get drunk tonight. “And then getting chewed out by my boss…”  
  
“That Serizawa guys a real jerk, huh?”  
  
The comment made Sho’s smile turned more authentic, but he shook his head. “No, he’s right. It’s my fault for not letting it go.”  
  
“No, you’re admirable for being so avid about following things through,” Nino assured him. “It’s one of the things I like about you.”  
  
Sho wanted to ask what other things there were, but he refrained himself. Obviously it had to be about his handsome face, because there was no other reason he could come up with. All of the women who had admired him from afar backed off when they realized that Sho being unable to say no didn’t necessarily translate to gentleness.  
  
Besides, with the ways his emotions were tonight, Sho would far too susceptible to Nino’s empathetic words, and wanted to avoid a compromising situations if possible. Not only was Sho an infamous pervert when he drank, but he recently found himself thinking of Nino far too intimately.  
  
Nino took his silence as something else though, and smirked before teasing with a face flushed by alcohol, “Are you going to take me home with you tonight, Sho? Because I’ll go if you ask me to…”  
  
“Of course not,” Sho let out a nervous laugh and averted his eyes. “This is an outing between colleagues, Nino.”  
  
“Of course,” Nino replied, but his tone didn’t sound like he thought that was the case at all. He leaned forward and began dishing food onto Sho’s place with a charming smile, and Sho’s face was red from more than the beer. He should probably stop at one, or he’d do something he’d regret tomorrow morning.  
  
Nino got himself some food too, and began nibbling at it as Sho did his best not to down the alcohol in one go. Nino’s gaze was pleased for a moment, but Sho saw the instant he changed, the light dimming a little and Nino’s expression becoming tight.  
  
“Hey, Sho?” he asked quietly, averting his eyes.  
  
Sho gave up and gulped down the rest of his beer before turning his attention fully to Nino, wondering what was wrong.  
  
“Yes?”  
  
“I know it’s not my place to ask, but… Why do you hate Enomoto so much?”  
  
Sho’d never met Enomoto before, but Serizawa, Aoto, and Nino seemed to think he was a decent person, despite his long list of crimes.  
  
From his standpoint, though, Sho could see the plain truth of the situation, and wasn’t fooled.  
  
“I’m telling you this because I trust you,” Sho said slowly, making sure Nino knew what he was getting himself in to. Nino’s eyes widened, but he nodded solemnly in understanding.  
  
Sho sighed and signaled for another beer.  
  
“My younger sister was working as a security analyst for the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Art three years ago,” he started quietly. “She worked closely with Enomoto for several months to upgrade their system. Before the update could be finished, a priceless ruby brooch was stolen from the display and my sister was immediately fired. Her career was ruined. She blames herself for all of it.”  
  
There was a moment of solemn silence, interrupted by the cheerful waitress bringing another pair of beers to the table. Sho immediately took his, but refrained from drinking any of it right away.  
  
“It was my first case as a lawyer under Serizawa. There were no clues left behind, not one finger print or hair out of place,” Sho eventually continued. “I was helpless and could only give up in the end.” The self loathing and shame was coming back and Sho felt the urge to hide his face from Nino, but he didn’t. Nino held his eyes, and Sho knew he could trust him. He _had_ to trust him.  
  
“Why do you think it was Enomoto?” Nino asked in a low voice. He didn’t accuse him of being wrong, and for that, Sho was grateful.  
  
“I didn’t consider it at all, until the case with Shiina Akira. Aoto was keeping me up to date on it—probably because I was the only one who’d listen. Then Enomoto suddenly disappears with fake diamonds in his wake? I talked to Kouno from police investigations and he filled in the gaps for me. Even if I can’t _catch_ him,” Sho stopped when his voice suddenly got passionate, and paused to collect himself. “Even if I can only prove it was Enomoto, that’s enough,” he said in a more controlled voice.  
  
“Enomoto, the perfectionist,” Nino whispered, as if he knew exactly what Sho was getting at.  
  
“Even when I confronted her about it, my sister told me it was her own fault, that Enomoto had nothing to do with it. Unless I can make a case against him, she’ll never forgive herself,” Sho ended quietly.  
  
“I understand,” Nino told him with a consoling expression, leaning across the table to gently touch Sho’s wrist, where his hand was still holding his beer. “I’ll… I’ll do my best to help you.”  
  
The expression that met Sho’s own was honest and a little painful—Sho knew how high of a regard Nino held for Enomoto. They’d been work partners for years, when Sho had only known Nino a few months. So he was grateful that Nino was so willing to help him despite that.  
  
“Thank you,” Sho finally smiled, and touched Nino’s hand lightly with own. Nino’s face softened and he looked down at Sho’s fingers bashfully as they pressed into his skin.  
  
But it was that moment that the cell phone in his pocket started buzzing, and Sho pulled it out immediately, hoping it wasn’t a call from Aiba demanding his attention because he hadn’t been invited tonight. When he answered it Nino frowned at him as if he was thinking the same thing.  
  
“This is Sakurai,” he said as professionally as possible. The noises from the bar were probably audible, but it was late and not like he was expected to be on shift, assuming it wasn’t Aiba.  
  
“Sho-chan!” It was his partner after all, and his panicked voice immediately sobered Sho up. “There was a break-in at The Annex!”  
  
“What?!” he gasped, mind going blank.  
  
“They stole it, the carpet with Enomoto’s print!”  
  
“Impossible…” Sho couldn’t think straight from shock. The day they’d moved it, the only piece of evidence left…  
  
“What is it?” Nino asked with worry, examining Sho’s face as he spoke with Aiba. But Sho didn’t have a moment to answer him, too worried about the news.  
  
“What are we going to do, Sho?” Aiba asked through the receiver.  
  
Sho’s eyes twitched back and forth without focusing on anything while he thought about it. What was there to do? The whole case seemed dismal from the beginning, but it was unfathomable to continue without even _one_ piece of evidence.  
  
Sho was never one to give up though, and he managed to find the ray of hope in such a terrible situation.  
  
“We’re going to find out who did it,” he replied without reserve, anger flooding through his veins, accelerated by the alcohol he’d consumed. “If we can it might lead us to Enomoto himself.”  
  
“Enomoto?” Nino whispered with a look of startlement, and leaned closer in order to keep up with the conversation.  
  
“Can we?” Aiba seemed doubtful, but Sho knew he would do anything that Sho asked him to. He could trust Aiba, and use his pure intent to his advantage. Nino was there too, and even if he couldn’t get along with Aiba, they were still a team. They would figure this case out together.  
  
“Fine out as much as you can and meet me back at the office. I’ll head to The Annex tomorrow as early as possible.”  
  
Sho hung up and began collecting his things before he paused, Nino’s hand on his shoulder.  
  
“Stop for a moment,” Nino said calmly. “Finish eating dinner, and drink some water. We’re going to need our wits about us if we’re not going to get any sleep tonight.”  
  
“We?” Sho asked, not sure if he could allow himself to read into Nino’s words like he wanted to.  
  
“I’m coming with you, of course,” confirmed Nino with a signature smirk on his cute little lips.

 

 

 

 

“You don’t look like you slept at all last night.”  
  
“I didn’t,” Nino replied to Jun’s statement, not looking away from his computer screen. He was checking the lock situation at The Annex, where Sho’s evidence had both been moved to and stolen from yesterday. It was fitted with a high tech security system from Nino’s own company, and that should have been more than enough to stop a break-in.  
  
“Oh, so you finally got past Sho’s defenses?” Jun teased, leaning against the table behind Nino’s computer.  
  
“Not at all, thank you for bringing that up and ruining my afternoon.” Nino liked to think he was on good terms with Jun, but not good enough that he was going to waste time in a conversation as stupid as this. Sho needed him, and Nino had made a promise he intended to make good on.  
  
“Well excuse me for asking, Mr. Moody,” replied Jun with an edge of irritation. He had a pretty short temper as well, which was probably why the two of them got along—although, unlike Nino, Jun had some sense of social propriety.  
  
“Did you need something?” Nino inquired, not taking his eyes off of his computer. The database told him what he wanted to know, now he’d have to head back over to The Annex to confirm things on the system. He’d call Sho for a ride as soon as Jun left him alone, but until then he’d check the lock types and locations documented in the company’s archive.  
  
“Just curious about what you’re up to. You come in late, change your schedule completely, and don’t even spare me a glance. Something must be happening.”  
  
“Going with Sho today,” Nino replied simply, hoping Jun would take the hint and back off. It wouldn’t be unusual for Nino to change his entire schedule for Sho, which he did at least every other week nowadays.  
  
“The stuff you do for that guy,” Jun grumbled, and pushed himself off the table. “I honestly thought you were just jerking him around since he’s such an uptight work-a-holic.”  
  
That was the final straw, the comment that made Nino give up on his work to take care of Jun.  
  
Nino stood up and swung around irritably, grabbing Jun’s shirt sleeve with a level glare. “Get out.”  
  
Jun looked surprised at the unusual aggression, and raised his hands in surrender, even though Nino still forced him over to the door himself.  
  
“And don’t come back!” he added as he shoved Jun outside. The words were harsh, but he knew Jun wouldn’t listen to him. He’d probably be back the second Nino returned that night, prodding him again about things with Sho, and maybe this time Nino would actual give him the details.  
  
That was another reason they got along; Jun didn’t take Nino’s curt words to heart, and Nino forgave him for never doing what Nino asked him to.  
  
  
  
  
  
On the drive to The Annex, Nino debriefed Sho on what he’d found in the database—that there had been no alarms reported or unauthorized access granted. Now the only thing to do was double check the main computer at the location itself, and see if it held a clue.  
  
Sho was looking just as haggard as Nino felt. They’d gone to The Annex first thing that morning to examine the crime scene, and nothing seemed amiss at all, other than the single piece of missing evidence. The police were blaming it on the carrier, but the data log was properly filled out, along with a single photo in the evidence’s file, located in another room.  
  
But, without the actual evidence there was no way to get the test that Sho needed to make it valid proof against Enomoto; the last hope was to find the culprit that had stolen it and track him down. Nino knew Sho was hoping to come face to face with Enomoto, but Nino didn’t think that was likely to happen. His old sempai was meticulous, cunning, and brilliant. It was a miracle in the first place that any evidence had been left at all. And besides, Enomoto would know something as miniscule as _that_ wasn’t worth coming out of hiding for.  
  
Nino was of the opinion that Sho should just give up the case as well, for two reasons. There was nothing to support the case, and hadn’t been from the beginning. Plus, as Sho suspected, Nino really did have a lingering attachment to Enomoto, who had taught him everything he knew about locks and security systems. It was painful for him to be used by Sho because of his past relationship, but Nino was determined to do anything he could to help out, especially after hearing Sho’s reasons the night before.  
  
Although everyone had assumed his affection for Sho was just playing around or killing time, Nino was starting to think that Sho knew he wasn’t just joking—or at least hoped that was the case. Nino would prove his words nonetheless.  
  
They got out of the car and walked to The Annex in silence, conserving their energy.  
  
“Identification please,” asked the guard in the reception box just outside the door, and Sho pulled out his badge. As he wrote his name on the log, the guard turned to Nino with an irritated look and added, “You too.”  
  
“Are you _serious_?” Nino replied with a frown. His tone sounded harsher than usual, probably due to the turn in Sho’s case and his lack of sleep the night before. “Can you not see this tag on my vest?” He pointed to the Tokyo Sogou Security lapel, and where his name badge was placed underneath it.  
  
“Sorry,” the guard replied with a level look. “After yesterday’s break in we’re asking _everyone_ to sign in.”  
  
“They didn’t this morning,” Nino shot back, but gave in and grabbed the pen out of Sho’s hand the moment he was finished, scrawling his name and ignoring the on-duty guard. Once they were done, the two of them entered the small one-story building for the second time that day.  
  
It was humid and hot inside—The Annex was really a cheap storehouse for Police evidence that had been deemed worthless, but that couldn’t be thrown away. It had been an insult for the Enomoto case, having their evidence moved here, but Sho had taken it in stride like he always had, his head held high.  
  
The place was as they had left it. Rows and rows of tightly packed metal shelves lined the floor, covered in dust and packed as full as possible with various boxes and bags holding items that had been used in police investigations. The only place the dust was disturbed was in the corner, where there floor had been swept clean with so many footprints going back and forth to move the new evidence in and out. The space where their evidence should have been was empty, nothing but a label and small scrap of paper with the file number next to it.  
  
“The building was secure, with our security system in place,” Nino mumbled as they walked past the scene of the crime. They’d gone over the details that morning already, but Nino had picked up the scent of the locked room mystery, even if he couldn’t figure things out quite as easily as their usual cases. “No break-in records and the doors should have been locked. Need to double check the tapes,” he said, more to himself than Sho, and Sho didn’t reply, since that’s where they’d been headed in the first place.  
  
Instead Sho let out a breath of exhaustion and led the way towards the back corner where there was a metal door leading to the control room.  
  
The guard at the front had given them the key to the room, which was also fitted with an electronic padlock from Tokyo Sougo Security. Sho inserted the key first and turned it before entering the pin number for the second lock and pushing the heavy door open, allowing Nino to enter first.  
  
The room was small, half of it taken up by computers and monitors on one wall, and the rest of the space taken up by two flimsy plastic chairs in front of the full table.  
  
Without any prompting, Nino sat in one of the seats, and Sho slid in next to him, allowing the door to shut heavily behind them.  
  
It took no time at all before Nino had entered the system and pulled up the security cameras from the previous day. He opened three angles on a bigger monitor so that Sho could see them easily, one from outside, one from the doorway, and one covering the row of evidence in question. After visually confirming the videos, Nino began to fast forward it until the truck arrived at the time it was scheduled to with the items being transported.  
  
They watched for five minutes as three men in uniforms began unloading various labeled boxes, carried them inside, and organized them on the shelves. Their piece of evidence was there, pulled out of box and properly logged by an employee before he wrote the description on the shelf and moved on to the next piece.  
  
“Could you save a copy of this for me?” Sho asked, pulling an SD card out of his pocket, and Nino nodded, inserting it in the machine and doing as he was requested to while the video continued to play.  
  
Once the men in the video had finished their work and left, Nino began to fast forward, watching for anything suspicious.  
  
A subtle change happened after they had sped through about five hours of video, and Nino jumped at the same time that Sho did.  
  
“Rewind it,” Sho asked unnecessarily, since Nino’s fingers were already doing just that.  
  
In the video only five minutes before, the bag was there then suddenly disappeared out of thin air.  
  
“A loop…” Sho guessed, and Nino nodded as they watched it again in slow motion.  
  
“But if someone looped the video, they had to have access to the system to get the feed in the first place, and switch off the alarms,” Nino explained. “This is an older version—they could have done it from any computer with an entry point for Tokyo Sougo Security…” he trailed off, assuming Sho could get the rest.  
  
“And then while the video was looping, just walk right in here.”  
  
“Except the guard at the door,” Nino added, his fingers furiously typing as he brought up the access log for this particular computer, and as he expected, it was wiped clean. He’d have to hack the system to find out what had been accessing the network at a time that coincided with the crime yesterday—but their window of time could be several hours or more.  
  
Well, the first step was to see if anything was obvious. If not, they could go back and watch the tape to try figuring it out better. At least there was a clear path to take to find out who the culprit was.  
  
“We’ll get the sign-in log on our way out, but Aiba’s interrogating the guard from yesterday right now. In his initial statement the guard said there was no one suspicious, and he didn’t even leave his post to use the bathroom.”  
  
“That will have to wait until we’re done here,” Nino told him with a sigh. He was so tired that he couldn’t keep up his positive energy, not even for Sho who needed the encouragement more than Nino did. “I’m gonna hack this thing.”  
  
“What?!” Sho suddenly jerked his head in surprise, and took his SD card when Nino handed it to him, to replace it with his own.  
  
“No choice. The person needed a code to access the security network. I’ll check out who was accessing this particular setup yesterday afternoon, around the time of the looped video. I should be able to see their employee number.”  
  
Sho remained silent as Nino’s fingers typed away, the only sound in the room the clinking of the keys as they moved in succession. It was obvious that Sho didn’t want to do anything compromising, but Nino knew that he was desperate enough that he was willing to face the consequences if it came down to that. Hacked information wouldn’t hold up in court, and Nino’s job could be in jeopardy if he was discovered.  
  
The program from Nino’s card started running, and Nino paused to watch the progress bar fill up, the numbers jumping every few seconds.  
  
“Could it be Enomoto?” Sho finally asked in a rough voice. Nino knew that was the only obvious answer, but he couldn’t believe it himself. Yes, Enomoto would easily find access to an employee number, but Nino still wasn’t convinced there was a reason for him to dispose of that last piece of evidence. Not with such a huge risk.  
  
“I don’t think so,” was all Nino could reply. Sho must have known he would say that, and he nodded with a disappointed look, confirming Nino’s intuition that they were both on the same wave length.  
  
When the program’s progress reached 99%, suddenly the monitor went black, along with the lights overheard and all of the screens lining the wall.  
  
“What the hell?!” Sho exclaimed while Nino just stared in front of himself without moving, trying to figure out what had happened.  
  
His hacking program should have broken through the system without causing any alarms to go off, or even leaving a trace of presence on the network. There was no reason for the loss of power unless the security system had been re-formatted…  
  
The second Nino realized he’d fallen right into a trap, he slapped himself on the forehead and slumped heavily on top of the keyboard, squeezing his eyes shut and wishing he hadn’t been more cautious. He may have just lost every clue that had been left behind here, ruining any chance Sho had had—no matter how small it had been.  
  
“Nino?” Sho asked tentatively. Emergency lights had come on around their feet, but it was barely enough to make out the shape of each other in the dark. Nino wished he’d just disappear altogether.  
  
“I’m sorry, it’s my fault,” he admitted in a small voice. “They knew what I would do, somehow.”  
  
“What?”  
  
“They predicted I would hack the system and reformatted it so that, when I did, the system would fail.”  
  
“Then that means…” Sho trailed off, and Nino noticed him glance at the door out of the corner of his eyes.  
  
“Yeah, the door probably won’t open.”  
  
Sho stood up, but he could barely fit behind Nino’s chair to reach it, and jarred Nino’s hunched body when he slammed his shoulder into the door to test its strength. The thing was three full inches of metal, so there was no way they would break their way out with physical force alone. If the power had been on, Nino could override the lock easily, but all of their options had been cut off along with the electricity.  
  
“So we’re stuck,” Sho whispered in horror. Nino finally straightened back up to look over at Sho, feeling terrible at the way the situation had turned. “And all of our things are outside.”  
  
“That’s not the part you should be worried about,” Nino assured him. “If the guard outside doesn’t call someone, Tokyo Sougo Security will receive a message about the failure. Someone will be over to let us out in an hour, if not sooner.”  
  
“What should I be worried about, then?” Sho snapped back, turning to Nino. They were so close that when Nino looked up at him, his chin brushed against Sho’s white dress shirt.  
  
“That the failure caused all of the data to be erased.”  
  
Sho’s mouth fell open a little in horror, and Nino could barely make out the outline of Sho’s handsome face in the dim light.  
  
“If it was erased, I might be able to find a copy of it in the logs,” Nino sighed, overcome with exhaustion. He closed his eyes and leaned his head against Sho’s abdomen, even if he probably didn’t deserve to with his giant mistake. “And you have a copy of the loop, anyway.”  
  
“Yeah,” Sho replied softly, and placed his hand gently on the back of Nino’s head. “I’m sorry I dragged you into this.”  
  
“Don’t say that. This is my fault.”  
  
“No… We both played right into their hand. They knew I would drag you here, and that you would help me.” Sho’s voice had lost its edge, and Nino imagined he was on the last bit of his energy. Now that there was no stimulation to keep their minds moving, there was only so much farther they could push themselves.  
  
“Sit down, Sho,” Nino insisted, pulling away, despite being delighted at the affection Sho was giving him, even if it was only out of pity. “All we can do right now is wait.”  
  
“You’re right.” Sho shifted behind him again and slumped into the chair, leaning his elbows heavily against the table in front of them.  
  
Nino touched Sho’s shoulder lightly, trying to comfort him in the same way he’d been comforted a minute ago. He wasn’t sure if Sho would find it strange, though, so he went slowly. When Sho didn’t brush him off, Nino rubbed his back, glad he was able to feel Sho, since he couldn’t see him very well.  
  
“Thank you,” Sho said softly, then yawned uncontrollably and became limp against the desk. “For everything,” he added as his eyes closed. It only took a few moments until Sho’s breath had steadied out, and Nino could tell the exhaustion had taken over.  
  
 _Thank you… for everything._  
  
Sho’d said the same words _that_ time too.  
  
 _Nino froze the second the larger man came at him, fury written on his face at the way Nino had torn apart his crime and rubbed his face in it. The man had deserved every moment of it with what he’d done, but Nino should have been more cautious, should have realized there was a breaking point. Nino hadn’t even wanted to be there, he regretted agreeing to help that stupid lawyer with his stupid case simply because he’d been curious.  
  
His own arms came up automatically to keep the blow from landing on his face, but it didn’t come.  
  
Sho was there. That’s when he’d properly remembered his name. Sho.  
  
Sho’s broad shoulders and strong back, blocking the other man from getting to him.  
  
When the second attack came, Sho was pushed back into Nino, who was pressed against the wall, his breath knocked out of him. Sho took the blows meant for Nino with grunts of pain, but he didn’t give up his protective stance, and once an opening presented itself, Sho took down the man with a well placed punch to the center of his chest.  
  
The man fell gasping for breath, and Aiba managed to break in from there, pushing the man down while three policemen on duty entered the room.  
  
Sho crumbled to the floor, taking Nino with him.  
  
There were no words to say. Nino was in shock, not only by the situation itself, but by how willing Sho had been to help him when he had no responsibility to. Nino had dug himself that hole and deserved what was coming to him, but Sho had taken the punishment for him without hesitation.  
  
No one had ever done that before. Nino’s sharp defenses had always brought the same in return until Sho came, who was genuinely kind to him instead.  
  
“Nino…” Sho wheezed out with a wry grin on his face. “Sorry you had to see that.”  
  
Nino helped him sit up with wide eyes, and Sho only chuckled.  
  
“You solved the case after all. Thank you… for everything.”  
  
It was that moment that Nino had decided to do all within his power to repay Sho’s kindness.  
  
Even if it meant giving his entire self to him._  
  
Nino played with Sho’s hair for a second, listening to Sho’s deep breaths coming in and out where he was crumpled against the table, but he was also losing himself to fatigue as well. There really wasn’t much they could do for the next hour, and both were in dire need of naps after exhausting themselves over this case for the last two days.  
  
Before he let himself succumb to sleep as well, Nino leaned down and pressed his lips to Sho’s cheek, stealing a kiss for purely selfish reasons.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
“So this is what you were up to,” Jun sighed.  
  
Nino was too depressed to think of a witty reply, so he just nodded weakly, wiping a thin line of sweat from his forehead. As he had predicted, the power had been restored just less than an hour later—waking them both up from their compromising positions—and before Nino could access the lock himself, the door was already opening from the other side.  
  
Not only Jun, but Aiba and Serizawa were waiting there for them, along with three police officers and the guard from the front desk. Before Aiba could do more than hand Sho a bottle of water, Serizawa was already lecturing him in a rough voice and face wrinkled in anger.  
  
Jun handed Nino a bottle of water as well, and slowly led him to a corner while the other people suddenly became a storm of arguing and interrogation.  
  
“A hacking report came into the office. I didn’t tell any of them about it, though,” Jun whispered, indicating the police and lawyers over their shoulder. “Boss wants to talk to you when we get back.”  
  
“Hmm,” Nino mumbled. It was a pretty bad scenario, but he couldn’t bring himself to feel any worse than he already did. He wanted to check the system right away, but he imagined after his hacking attempt, his access ID would be temporarily suspended. Asking Jun for help was an option, but somehow that didn’t sit right with Nino. He wanted to do the work himself and make up for his mistake.  
  
“I’ll talk to him about it, soften the blow a little. God knows you won’t,” Jun teased with a forced smile, and patted Nino heavily on the back.  
  
“Nino, I brought a rice ball for you,” Aiba called out as he broke away from the verbal fray.  
  
“I don’t need you wasting even _more_ of my time, Sakurai—“  
  
Sho was trying to hold his temper while being outrightly criticized by his boss, and Nino suddenly wanted to jump in there and defend him. Had the situation been different and Nino’s mood better, he wouldn’t have hesitated to do so. He had taken an automatic step towards Serizawa, but Jun was grabbing onto his arm, and now Aiba was blocking his way too.  
  
He held out the rice ball with an uneasy expression and Nino glared at him.  
  
“Drink some water too,” Jun urged. “It must have been hot in there.”  
  
Nino had barely felt the heat in his exhaustion, and his attention had been focused on Sho anyway.  
  
Not knowing what else to do, he did as he was told, drinking half the bottle in one go and eating the food without really tasting it. He was itching to push past Aiba and give Serizawa a piece of his mind—even if everything Serizawa was saying was accurate.  
  
“What are you going to do, pull the stupid thing out of thin air? It was stolen, it’s probably been destroyed by now!”  
  
“Breaking into the Police’s evidence room is a huge crime!” Sho argued back, “If nothing else, that justifies my investigation this afternoon—“  
  
“An ‘investigation’ that has not been assigned to you! Are you really ready to put your job on the line for this?”  
  
That threat made Sho stop and swallow, a bead of sweat running down his temple.  
  
“There’s nothing for you to stand on now. Not that there was in the beginning,” Serizawa said in a calmer voice. There was compassion in his eyes, and that was the only thing that kept Nino where he was. He too wished that Sho would give up the case, but if he decided not to, Nino would continue to follow him. Even if his own job was on the line.  
  
“This is your last warning, Sakurai,” Serizawa said evenly with a pointed look, then turned and strode out of the building while the rest of them watched in silence.  
  
Once he was gone, Aiba whined, “Sho…” and Nino’s irritation came back full force. If not for the fact that when Sho glanced over he met Nino’s eyes and not Aiba’s, there would have been more rather scathing comments.  
  
“Sorry, but I need to take Nino back to the office,” Jun said as casually as possible, his hand still lightly holding onto Nino’s arm.  
  
It felt more like a handcuff than a friendly gesture.  
  
“Right,” Sho replied unsurely, his gaze going from Nino to Jun, and then over to Aiba before flickering back to Nino. “Guess I’ll be going back to the office too. We can finish this another time, Nino.”  
  
“I’ll call you later,” Nino promised. There was worry in Sho’s face, as if he knew exactly what Nino had gotten himself into for his sake. But Nino would take the responsibility for himself.  
  
“Okay,” Sho replied quietly, his gaze never leaving Nino as Jun pulled him outside and to the company car waiting there.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
“Are you sure you don’t want something more to eat, Sho?” Aiba asked nervously as he looked around the tiny shop. Instead of going back to the office, Aiba had suggested taking a short lunch break to cool down before facing Serizawa again, and Sho considered it good advice. Except he had no appetite and all he could think about was what he’d done to Nino. From the beginning he knew what kind of pressure he’d been putting on the other man, but Sho hadn’t realized how far Nino was willing to go for him—or how far Sho was willing to make him.  
  
If the look on Jun’s face was anything to go by, Nino would be out of a job in a few hours.  
  
“I mean, it was really hot in there and I don’t want you to get sick. And it must have been stressful with Nino and everything—“ Aiba asked innocently, and Sho raised his hand in annoyance, cleanly cutting off his statement.  
  
“I have no problem being alone with Nino.”  
  
“But… locked there in that small room… Didn’t he try to…” Aiba lowered his voice, “ _seduce_ you, or something?”  
  
“Of course not!” Sho’s frown deepened. He stared angrily at his partner, waiting for an explanation.  
  
“You’re just so nice, Sho! You can never say no to anyway, so I was worried, being stuck like that…” Aiba’s voice was low and unsure, and he eventually trailed off when he realized his point wasn’t being validated. “Sorry,” he mumbled pathetically, hunching over and Sho felt his nerves soften automatically.  
  
“I assure you if I am seduced it is of my own volition,” Sho said sharply, then drained the rest of his coffee in one gulp, standing up to indicate they were finished with their break.  
  
Aiba followed him silently to the front counter to pay the bill, and then to the company car parked out back. Sho would still rather stay away from the office, but he had nothing to do, no other investigations or meetings. He’d like to go see Nino, but Nino hadn’t responded to his three messages yet, so he could only wait.  
  
Starting up the car with a creased brow, but too bothered by Aiba’s pouting, Sho finally sighed and started a new conversation as he pulled out of the parking lot.  
  
“Did you find out anything else while I was… indisposed?”  
  
Aiba perked up a little and looked over at Sho, even if he didn’t meet the hopeful expression.  
  
“Well, they moved us up on the waiting list, but I suppose that’s useless now,” he deflated again.  
  
“Yes,” Sho confirmed with another deep sign. Serizawa was right, the chances of them finding the stolen evidence were slim; it was most likely destroyed already, or if it turned up it could have been tampered with.  
  
“…What’re we going to do, Sho?” Aiba asked quietly.  
  
Sho couldn’t answer right away. It was something he’d been thinking about in between worrying about Nino and responding to Aiba.  
  
When it came down to it, though, nothing was different from this morning.  
  
“See what Nino can find out,” he said, and a bitter taste came to his mouth.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Nino’s boss had chewed him out for several hours, but the whole thing had turned out better than anyone could have expected otherwise. The primary reason for that was most likely that Nino couldn’t be replaced as easily as he had replaced Enomoto. Besides, in Nino’s depression, he wasn’t nearly as scathing in his defense as he usually would have been.  
  
His access privileges had been reinstated at the end of the meeting, and it was late evening by the time they were done. Nino was grateful for his hour nap with Sho, and even if he was dead on his feet, the first place he went was back to the basement to get on the computer.  
  
He had just been lectured about the moral ethics of hacking his own work system and the consequences that would be taken if it ever happened again, but Nino didn’t hesitate to find another card with the hacking program on it and plug it into the system. It was take a little more legwork, but he could access The Annex’s security system from here, and this time he would be careful of any traps laid out for him. Sho would be over soon, and Nino wanted to find out the results before he got there.  
  
If the data had been erased he’d hate himself forever.  
  
As he waited for his computer to boot up, Nino began shoving rice crackers into his mouth one after another. He had taken every one that had been left in the break room because he was starving and wasn’t planning on leaving the office for the rest of the night. It wasn’t the best dinner, but it would do, and maybe Sho would bring him something better.  
  
Nino wiped the crumbs off of his chin as he stared at the screen, then his fingers flew across the keys as he searched for the access point he needed, the one that would lead to the security system history. Numbers and letters filtered across the screen, and he followed them until he finally found what he was looking for. He began typing again and then took a sigh of relief, leaning back in his chair.  
  
The files were intact. The video camera videos, login files, everything was as it should be.  
  
Now all he had to do was override the authorization with his hacking program and he could take a peek at what exactly had transpired.  
  
The end of the locked room mystery was in sight, and Nino found himself unconsciously rubbing his fingers together in anticipation. It was a habit he’d gotten from Enomoto, one that he’d tried to break time and time again, especially after he’d started working with Sho, but to no avail.  
  
This time he did a little default programming and checked the base of the system, finding tracing of the earlier trap that had been set for him—which was now useless. Just in case he logged that away on his computer, knowing it would be useful later if this was actually as serious as it appeared to be.  
  
When everything seemed okay, he inserted his card and started his hacking program again, nervously waiting as the completion bar filled up second by second. If he was found out his boss would surely fire him for this, caught directly after his long lecture on the subject.  
  
This time it reached 100% without any problems, and several windows opened on Nino’s monitor instantaneously. He scanned over them quickly, then did a search for the time frame and system location he wanted.  
  
There it was, the log that had been created when someone accessed the security videos, and then again when they had reformatted the trap that Nino had fallen into the next day.  
  
He clicked on the item and waited for his program to overwrite the restricted access.  
  
It opened the log, displaying the profile and ID number that had access the point, every small piece of information that could be tracked by the system.  
  
“No…way,” he gasped as he read through it, his mouth becoming slack as he realized who had been behind it all.  
  
It must have been a mistake. Someone must have stolen the ID and—  
  
“You don’t know when to stop, do you?”  
  
Nino shot up out of his chair and turned around, blocking the computer with his body. It wasn’t too late—  
  
Jun was standing there with a steaming cup of coffee in his hand, but he solemnly set it on the table, his eyes never leaving Nino’s petrified face.  
  
It took a moment of floundering until Nino got his voice to work.  
  
“Jun… Y-you—“  
  
“Yes, that was me. Unfortunately I didn’t have enough time or skill to finish the job. I’m not quite as good as you, or Enomoto.”  
  
Nino swallowed, unable to back up when Jun took a menacing step closer.  
  
“Why?” Nino whispered. He’d thought all along that Jun had been his friend, his comrade here at Tokyo Sougo Security, when in fact he had been hindering Sho’s investigation behind their backs.  
  
Jun didn’t answer, just took another step closer until he was breathing slowly and steadily onto Nino’s face.  
  
There was a tense moment between them when suddenly a loud clanging noise came from the door being opened, and then Sho’s voice rung out in the still room.  
  
“I’m here, Nino! How’d things turn out?”  
  
Sho walked straight into the room and paused when he saw them, staring at the way Jun was cornering Nino against his computer.  
  
Before Sho could do anything else, Jun grabbed Nino and twisted his arm behind his back with one hand while the other one when around Nino’s neck. Even though Nino grasped at it, Jun had muscles that were always hidden under his suit jacket, and Nino could feel his breathing capacity cut in half with the constriction.  
  
“What are you doing?!” Sho asked dangerously, crouching a little and taking on a defensive stance. “Let him go.”  
  
“If you do as I ask you to, Sho-san,” Jun replied easily, pulling Nino’s arm harder and causing him to wince in pain.  
  
Sho stared him down for a moment, searching his face for any indication that he was only joking, then straightened up and nodded slightly to show his cooperation.  
  
“Good. Put everything in your pockets there on the table.”  
  
Moving slowly and pointedly, Sho did so, placing his badge, cell phone, wallet, keys, and a piece of candy next to the cup of coffee Jun had put there minutes earlier.  
  
Satisfied, Jun nodded and loosened his grip on Nino just slightly. “Now,” he said carefully, pushing Nino forward, and Nino had no choice but to go since Jun was holding up half of his body weight already. They approached Sho, who only took a tiny step back, glancing at the arm around Nino’s neck apprehensively. “Keep going,” Jun prompted in a low voice, so Sho did, until his back hit a wall, sending a subtle metal sound across the room.  
  
“Open it and get inside,” Jun directed, and Sho, confused, turned around slowly to find himself stationed in a front of a plain steel locker that would most likely be housing cleaning supplies.  
  
When he hesitated, Jun tightened his arm around Nino’s neck, making him gasp for loss of air, and Sho complied right away, fumbling for the handle and opening behind his back so he didn’t have to turn away from them.  
  
Jun stepped forward again, and Sho backed into the locker, which was barely wide enough to accommodate the width of his sloping shoulders. Suddenly Nino was thrust at him so they both hit the rear of the locker, and Sho stumbled over the mop and broom that had been housed there.  
  
The door was closed. There was barely room for the two of them standing in there.  
  
And then there was a click.  
  
Jun moved away and light filtered in from the five slits at eye level. Nino clung to Sho’s shirt, gasping for breath, and then suddenly turned to slam himself against the door. It didn’t open and Nino knew it wouldn’t. Although the lock wasn’t anything complicated and had only been here as part of Enomoto’s collection, it would be impossible to open in this situation. The mechanism was completely on the other side.  
  
“Jun!” he pounded on the locker while staring through the slits.  
  
“Sorry to do this to you two, but I need a little time to make it to the airport. Guess this is farewell,” he said conversationally as he pulled out his own phone and dialed a number.  
  
Nino could only watch helplessly, overcome with countless emotions.  
  
“Didn’t mean to keep you waiting,” Jun said into the speaker with a small smile, his countenance relaxed considering what he’d just done. He paused and replied, “Yeah, I just finished now. You want to talk with him?”  
  
Jun took a step back towards the locker, pressing a button on his phone, and then held it up for Nino to see the screen.  
  
All of the passion drained out of him in a millisecond, and he was overcome with shock again.  
  
“Enomoto…” Sho mumbled behind him, pressed against Nino’s back so that he could see through the holes too.  
  
“Ninomiya-kun,” Enomoto replied. His picture was on the screen and he bowed slightly to them. In the corner was another camera showing the front of the locker, the interior too dark to make out their faces.  
  
“Enomoto-san…” Nino whimpered. He hadn’t changed at all since he had last seen him, wearing his usual sweater and thick black glasses.  
  
“I have to apologize for Matsumoto-kun. He did many unnecessary things that hurt you and Sakurai-kun for the sake of his pride.”  
  
Jun frowned at the back of his phone, but it looked more like a pout than actual anger.  
  
“He was supposed to leave with me, but when he heard about the evidence you had… he decided to stay and wipe everything clean, even though I told him it wasn’t necessary. He’s a very prideful man, as I’m sure you know.”  
  
Nino’s eyes were starting to tear up now as his emotional turmoil tripled. He’d had no idea that Jun had even been connected to Enomoto, much less so intimately.  
  
“Sakurai-kun is there too, right? I wanted to apologize for the trouble you’ve both gone through because of me.”  
  
There were no words to be said, so Nino remained silent, closing his eyes when the tears made his vision blur.  
  
Enomoto paused, leaving a space for Nino to speak, then continued on when he didn’t.  
  
“I imagine this will be the last time we’ll ever speak to each other, so I can properly say goodbye this time. Jun, you make sure to as well,” he added, his voice never changing. Sho’s fists were clenched against the front of the locker on either side of Nino’s chest.  
  
When the next pause came, Nino still couldn’t respond, but Sho rattled the metal walls as much as he could and growled, “Enomoto!”  
  
“I didn’t mean for your sister to take the blame, Sakurai-kun. Although I’m sorry to say, I can’t give you what you want. No one was cooperating with you anyway,” Enomoto replied calmly. “If you’re not going to give up the case, you’ll have to come to America to get me.”  
  
Nino flinched when Sho hit the door in frustration, but reached out to grab his hand and support him. Sho grasped onto it tightly, and Nino returned the pressure.  
  
“We’ve wasted enough time, Matsumoto-kun. You know what to do,” Enomoto finished in a lower voice, and Nino felt a shiver of fear run up his spine.  
  
“Yeah,” Jun replied, turning the phone back to face him and staring at the screen. “See you soon, Kei.”  
  
“Yes, Jun,” Enomoto replied with an edge of exasperation, and they immediately cut the call.  
  
Jun shoved the phone back into his pocket and pulled out a set of gloves. After he put them on, he went over to Nino’s computer, leaving the chair where it had rolled away several feet, and leaned over to type on the keyboard. The angle wasn’t the best, but Nino guessed he was shutting down the program and deleting anything related to what he’d found earlier. When he was done, Jun pulled the power supply out completely and took Nino’s SD card (which he didn’t care about because there were another five with the same program on it).  
  
Although Jun was covering his ass, he was covering Nino’s too, and Nino felt relieved to know he hadn’t been _completely_ wrong about his friend.  
  
Nino and Sho had watched him work in silence, Sho pressing Nino against the locker door and straining his neck to see as well as Nino could. When the computer was taken care of, Jun glanced around the room before making his way back to the locker, standing in front of it casually.  
  
“As he said, this is goodbye, Nino. I really did consider you a friend, no matter how much of a pain in the ass you are. Hope you’ll forgive me.” Jun’s lips just barely turned up in a small smile, and Nino knew just as well as Jun did that he would. Nino always forgave him, despite his intuition.  
  
“Take good care of him, Sho-kun. Treat him like he deserves to be, don’t just use him.”  
  
Nino felt Sho stiffen a little, then let out a small sigh against the back of his neck.  
  
“I’ll send your partner a message when I’m at the airport. Meanwhile you two enjoy your alone time, okay?” Jun teased before saluting and heading towards the door without another word said.  
  
When it closed behind him, the metal made an echoing sound in the large room, and Nino felt his mind come back, as if the last five minutes had been a dream he’d woken up from.  
  
“I’m sorry,” Nino mumbled timidly, leaning forward to press his head against the front of the locker. If Jun hadn’t caught him, they might have had a chance…  
  
“Don’t apologize. That should be me. I should have let it drop already… Enomoto’s right.” Sho’s arm moved to embrace Nino around his waist, and Nino felt his heartbeat suddenly speed up.  
  
Nino didn’t reply to his statement, wondering if Sho’s resignation to reality was too much to hope for. Enomoto and Jun had both made a clean get-away, and Nino at least didn’t think there was anything to do about it now.  
  
“I guess…there’s no way to get out of here, is there?” Sho sighed, pushing on the door with his free hand.  
  
“I know the combination, if someone happens to come down here…”  
  
Nino swallowed, daring to put his own arm on top of the one Sho had around him.  
  
“But… no one ever comes down here except you and Jun.”  
  
“I know,” Sho whispered against his ear, and Nino closed his eyes.  
  
“How long will it take Jun to get to the airport?”  
  
“Two hours or less,” Sho answered properly, his proximity just as close as before.  
  
“E-even if we get out, we won’t be able to catch him,” Nino commented, finding that talking wasn’t distracting himself at all.  
  
“I know.”  
  
“Even if we _could_ catch him, there’s no evidence against him…” Jun accessing anything on their network wouldn’t be unusual. Even if they somehow connected it to the crime it would be easily wiped away as a coincidence.  
  
“I know,” Sho replied again, then placed his other hand on Nino’s hip, urging him to turn around despite the small space.  
  
Nino fumbled as he did so, tripping over his own feet and the cleaning supplies that had fallen over. He was smaller than Sho, but not by much, and his elbows still bumped the sides of the locker until he was in a position to lean back against the door.  
  
“I’m sorry I used you,” Sho said quietly, the light from the slits reflecting in his eyes as he stared at Nino, their faces so close.  
  
“It’s… I was… willing,” Nino swallowed, his gaze jumping from Sho’s eyes to his mouth and back again.  
  
“I don’t deserve your help,” Sho added in a deeper voice, and Nino tentatively placed his hands on Sho’s shoulders. Sho’s arms were rested above Nino’s head, on either side of him, and Sho was leaning in closer.  
  
“You don’t have a choice about that,” Nino teased him with a small smile.  
  
“Thank you…for everything.” Sho gave him a small smile in return, and slowly—ever so slowly—closed the space between them for a gentle kiss.  
  
Nino knew that extreme circumstances made people emotional, and he was grateful again to Jun for helping him out, however underhanded he’d been. All he could do was hope that, once they were out and Sho was thinking levelly again, that he wouldn’t regret this.  
  
The kiss deepened gradually, Nino tilting his chin and parting his lips slightly to feel Sho’s tongue against his. It felt just as good as he had dreamed it would, Sho’s full mouth and perfect teeth and—  
  
A loud buzzing filled the room, jolting the two of them out of their moment, and Nino craned his head to see over his shoulder. Where it had been left on the table, Sho’s phone was vibrating rather distractingly with an incoming call.  
  
Of course they couldn’t answer it.  
  
  
  
  
  
  
Eventually it was Aiba who had come to the rescue with a vague message from Jun, no doubt a few minutes before he boarded this international flight out of Japan.  
  
Sho and Nino had made a police report, but as expected, the whole thing was dismissed with barely any consideration at all.  
  
Serizawa gave Sho the next day off for “mental” purposes, and Nino followed him home. They both slept for twelve hours and then Nino cuddled Sho as they watched the news—of course there was nothing about Enomoto or Jun or anything that had happened at all over the last few days.  
  
It seemed as if Sho had given up, even if he didn’t make a formal announcement. He came to Nino a few days later with a new case about a child that had escaped a locked room with a priceless jewel unwittingly in tow. The distracted themselves with that for a while, but the answer had been obvious (at least to Nino) and the culprit had been cornered with a setup, using the jewel as bait.  
  
Nino suggested they go out to celebrate, blatantly calling it a date. Sho, who was already famous for his inability to say no, didn’t even attempt to turn Nino down.  
  
Although, when Aiba tried to invite himself, Nino was quite pleased when Sho refused and told him exactly the reason why. Aiba looked like he torn between pouting and giving Sho a lecture, but they didn’t hang around long enough to find out which it would be.  
  
For the second date Sho did the asking, and their relationship slowly started to develop into something deeper. A month later they could be found at a chic café in downtown Tokyo.  
  
“My sister’s getting married.”  
  
Nino smiled as he sipped his iced coffee, knowing that life was just about perfect right now. “That’s good news, isn’t it?”  
  
“She seems happy enough,” Sho mumbled, as if he wasn’t quite satisfied with the situation. “Pretending to be happy,” he corrected, and gave his own cup a hard stare.  
  
Nino frowned in return. They hadn’t talked about the topic since Jun had left, although he could read Sho’s dissatisfaction like an open book. Things hadn’t been settled at all, but until now Nino had assumed they would eventually, it would just take time.  
  
It seemed like Sho still wasn’t willing to settle, though.  
  
“So, Nino, I was thinking…”  
  
“Yes?” he asked with raised eyebrows, wondering if this was really going where he thought it was. A small spark of curiosity lit up in his stomach, that same itch that he got when Sho brought him a case that was so full of holes it didn’t seem like it could ever be solved. Nino couldn’t help it—his fingers started rubbing together as he brought his hand up to the side of his head, his heart hammering in his chest like it was the start of a new adventure.  
  
“How about going to America?”  
  
Yes that was it. Nino’s wrist twisted as if he had just unlocked a door, and he couldn’t help but smile in anticipation. He’d been missing Enomoto and Jun a bit after all, and this way he could have Sho all to himself.  
  
“Sure.”


End file.
